Fire Alarm
by KC Pendragon
Summary: College AU. One shot. "Cullen was taking a shower when the alarms went off. Had to rush out in a towel and not much else."


**Many thanks to mudbloodedslytherin, for looking over this and helping me figure out how to end this.**

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><p>Nyra had nearly finished her portrait for class when the alarm startled her. She jumped, upsetting the paints on her bed. She cursed as blue acrylic spread all over her comforter and splattered on her nearly perfect design.<p>

The string of curses continued as she grabbed her heaviest coat and stuffed her bare feet into boots. The leather rubbed awkwardly on her feet, but at least it'd be warm. Josie had warned her that the temperature was supposed to hit ten below freezing that night and the weather had outdone itself. It was already twelve below and the sun was just going down.

"This is going to be painful," she said over the alarms to her roommate.

Sera grunted. She had been napping and Nyra knew trying to get anything out of her would be like poking a sleeping dragon.

Once her boots were tied, Nyra grabbed her keys and walked out the door, following the other students down the back stairwell. She slipped on her coat as she walked down three flights of stairs, praying that perhaps her weather app had broken and maybe it wasn't so bad as she thought.

The moment she drew near the door, she knew it wasn't broken.

Creators, it was worse than that one time Svelia had accidentally locked her in Uncle Leon's meat freezer. She couldn't zip up her coat fast enough.

Sera stumbled out behind her, cursing enough to make a sailor blush. "Can't believe the scheduled a fucking fire drill on the coldest day of the year!" she huffed. "Piece of shite administration, I can tell you."

"I don't think it's a drill, Sera," Dorian said, walking over to the shivering girls. "I smelled something _awful_ when we were rushing out the door. Smelled like someone burnt plastic or something."

Nyra internally cursed (Sera cursed out loud enough for both of them). "Which means we're going to be out here for a while, aren't we?"

"At least until the firetrucks come," Dorian agreed.

She sighed. "We could at least head over to Koslun. At least it'll be warmer there." The science building was across the street from their dorm. It was after most classes were done, so at least a large flux of students coming in wouldn't disturb anyone (because once someone started going in, everyone else was likely to follow).

Dorian and Nyra walked, but Sera practically sprinted to the building (she had grabbed the sweatshirt nearest to her bed and was wearing gym shorts). The two chuckled at her hightailing it out of there. Nyra paused as she heard hoots and laughter coming from a few meters away. There was a crowd of boys - a few she recognized from the football team. She pointed to them.

"Any idea what's going on?" she asked.

Dorian shrugged. "No idea."

Her question was quickly answered as the crowd parted and she saw - oh Creators, that was a fine pack of abs. She saw Dorian do a double take as well.

"Suddenly I'm feeling very willing to shake the hand of whoever nearly burnt down the building," Dorian said absentmindedly. Nyra was almost ready to scold him, but she realized she was staring just as much.

"I'd second that," she replied. "If the poor dude wasn't likely freezing to death." Eventually she forced her eyes to move away and dragged Dorian with her to Koslun Hall. "Come on, I can't feel my legs."

"What took you sloths so long?" Sera asked when they got in, already settled on one of the couches.

"Since we actually wore clothes outside, we weren't rushing to get here," Nyra said. She did _not_ want Sera's teasing if she admitted she actually stared at a guy's bare chest for five minutes. Sera already got on her about being the 'ultra virgin'; actually showing interest in a guy would be nothing short of painful. "Now scoot." She shoved Sera's feet off the couch and fell back on the cushions. She stripped off her coat and threw it on the table in front of her.

She took out her phone and started texting her friend from another building, so that she wouldn't have to talk to Sera for a moment. Hopefully her roommate's short attention span would work to her advantage this time and she _wouldn't_ ask about her lagging again. Nyra was an awful liar and Sera knew it.

Nyra froze as she heard loud voices coming through the door. _Please let it not be them, please let it not be them_, she begged. Of course, she knew they'd likely come over. In fact, she was surprised the poor guy hadn't beaten them over. Creators, he was only in a towel and soaking wet after all.

"Come on, Cullen, it's not so bad. Plenty of girls will be asking for your number after this, I can tell you."

"Go away, Carroll."

"You know, the bathroom's not too far away. You can probably hide in there. I'll tell you when it's over."

"Thanks, Alistair."

_Don't look, don't look, _don't look, _you pervert_! she thought. Still, it didn't stop her cheeks from turning a bright red. She heard several pairs of footsteps behind her and then the slamming of a door.

She looked up to see her lab partner, Alistair, sit down across from her. "So… interesting evening, isn't it?" she said nonchalantly.

The guy next to Alistair burst out laughing.

"I guess I'll ask, since you're too scared to," Sera said, giving Nyra a pointed look. "Why's he not wearing any smalls?"

Alistair smiled awkwardly. "Cullen was taking a shower when the alarms went off. Had to rush out in a towel and not much else."

"Wait, so he's just in the bathroom, with nothing else but a towel on?" Nyra asked.

"Oh, is virgin Nyra finally having some sexy thoughts?" Sera asked, her smile becoming impish.

Nyra slapped Sera's thigh lightly, but her look was hardly amused. "I was more thinking about how cold he's got to be," she said. Still, Sera wiggled her eyebrows at her and she slapped her thigh again, a bit harder than last time. "You're impossible."

She grabbed her jacket and walked over to the restrooms. She knocked on the gentleman's door and then cracked it open enough to be heard. "Uh… Cullen? Sorry about… being stuck in a towel… you being stuck in a towel, I mean. Uh… Creators…." She swore a few times in elvish and then tried again. She stuck her arm holding her jacket through the door. "Here. It'd at least be a bit warmer than just your towel." She threw it a little ways away inside the bathroom, then slammed the door shut once her arm was clear. She booked it back to the couches and sat down, her face beet red.

"What were you up to?" Dorian asked suspiciously.

"What?" Nyra snapped back defensively. "I just thought he might be a bit cold, that's all." She crossed her arms tightly and curled into herself. She hoped Cullen didn't think she was creepy or weird or anything. _You gave him your jacket. Nothing weird or creepy about that_.

Still didn't help much. It took ages for her face to stop blushing.

…

It was almost an hour later that the firetrucks finally pulled out and they could go back to their dorm. Nyra was the first one out of there. She hoped that if Cullen didn't see her, he'd have to resort to letting Alistair return it during their next lab (thankfully the next day, because it was too cold for her to go long without it).

Sera wasn't far behind, spurred on by both her freezing arse and the opportunity to tease the living daylights out of Nyra. _Creators, save me from my crazy roommate_, she prayed.

Walking back into her room, Nyra sighed when she saw her ruined comforter and artwork. "Oh yeah, almost forgot about those," she muttered. "Almost."

The acrylic was already dried on the comforter, so Nyra worked her palette knife under it, trying to get the thickest part of the stains up. She also peeled off as much paint as she could manage, planning on painting over and incorporating the remains into the work (she had spent too bloody long on that thing to throw it away now). Thankfully, the blue hadn't gotten to the face, so anything else was manageable.

She left the paper on her desk to finish drying and then went back to her comforter. "I don't think I can salvage this," she said, picking up the edge and showing it to Sera. "My mom's going to murder my ass after a thorough '_I told you so. I told you not to paint on the bed. Do you know how much it costs to dry clean comforters?_' This should be fun."

"Maybe it'll be better than you think," Sera said. "Maybe that Cullen will come over and kiss you for giving him your jacket."

Nyra snorted. "Highly doubt that, but thanks for the sympathy."

"Oh, don't even tell me that he wasn't the reason you and Dorian were both late. Too distracted by his arse, I bet." Sera cackled with laughter, nearly falling off her bed.

"You're impossible," Nyra scoffed, rolling her eyes. "And I was a bit too distracted by his abs to pay attention to the back end," she muttered. Unfortunately, Sera heard her.

"I knew it!" she crowed. "The virgin Nyra finally finds someone worth looking at twice. Never thought I'd see the day!" This time, she did actually roll off the bed from laughter.

Nyra glared at her as Sera's head popped up into view again. "You're hilarious."

Sera almost answered when there was a sharp knock at the door. Nyra was closer, so she opened it.

She could feel the blood rushing to her face as she came face to face Cullen, fully clothed at last. And unfortunately, she could only gape at him like a fish.

"I suppose I ought to return this," he said, awkwardly holding her coat out to her.

She grabbed it, hugging it like a lifeline. Creators, why were guys so hard to talk to?

"Thank you," he said. "It was very comfortable."

She smiled shyly. "You needed it more than I did."

"I appreciate it," he said. "Next time I'll try to be more careful to not be in the shower when the alarm goes off."

"No, do it again!" Sera yelled from the back of the room. "She -" Nyra threw her coat at her idiot friend before she could say another word.

"Yes, well, no problem," she rushed, trying to get him to leave before Sera could say something even more embarrassing. "I suppose I'll see you around, then?"

"Actually," he rubbed the back of his neck, "there's a nice Orlesian place near here that my sister's been pushing for me to go to for a while and I was wondering… if you'd… I don't know…. Would you like to go there some time?"

If Nyra hadn't been gaping when she'd opened the door, she sure as hell now was. "Uh…"

"She'll go!" Sera answered for her. "Pick her up, Sunday, at 8. Don't be late!"

Cullen chuckled, then looked at Nyra. "Does that sound agreeable?"

Wordlessly, she nodded.

"Good," he said, shoulders relaxing a lot. (Had he been nervous?) "I'll… see you then?"

"Yeah, I guess so," she said, still not sure how to process what had happened.

"Great," he said. "I guess I'll… go now."

"See you Sunday," she said, before closing the door. She leaned against the wood and breathed. "So... what just happened?" she asked.

"You just got your first date," Sera said, then cackled. "Wait until I tell Dorian!"

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><p><strong>Art reflects life, as several things that happened here are based off true events. I live in an all-girls dorm, so obviously I have never had a fire drill quite like that, but I have heard several stories of poor folks being caught in the shower (and unfortunately, you have to evacuate the building, modesty be hanged) and a similar situation to Cullen (minus the ogling fans) did happen to one girl.<strong>

**Thanks to mudbloodedslytherin, there are several more college AU ideas, so this probably won't be the last you've heard of this Inquisitor, or some of the others that might pop up. If you want, send in any ideas for what could happen on Cullen and Nyra's date or other one shots! I'd love to hear them.**


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